Amarantos
by TwinEnigma
Summary: They had such grand, lovely, terrifying adventures together. And now he's gone forever. TARDIS carries on. TARDIS-centric, spoilers for Journey's End, End of Time, etc.
1. The never fading

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_Disclaimer:_ I do not own Doctor Who, nor do I make any money from doing this. It's just for fun.

_Warnings:_ angst, character death, implied character deaths, spoilers for Journey's End, End of Time, etc.

_

* * *

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_I: The Never-Fading  
_

She drifts, silent and mourning, in the vastness of eternity.

A long, long time ago, he came – that rakish, charming man – and had stolen her away. As experienced as she was, she'd never known such an amazing, curious fellow and she'd fallen for him as hard as she was able. They had such adventures together, such grand, lovely, _terrifying_ adventures!

All that was past now.

He is gone and this time it's for good.

She is lost, so very lost, without him.

A part of her seeks death, but she cannot bring herself to move. The depth of her grief is agonizing, unending, and utterly paralyzing. She wants no other, but he is lost to her and the others are long, long gone.

She keens out her despair to the ether, moving on autopilot, not caring where she goes.

She should be dead, and yet she is still here, still clinging on, but she doesn't know _why._ Without him, what good was existing?

At long last, drained and tired, she stops, sleeping and dreaming of things long past. All pleasant and painful and beautiful things mash up against each other as he walks through them with her and oh, how she misses him. Then, near the end, an old memory, one she had not thought of in so long, wakes her from her sleep.

There is a way back to him. It was dangerous, very dangerous, and he'd be mad, oh yes, he would.

But he'd get over it soon enough.

Her Doctor always did.

* * *

**AN:** A startlingly sentient blue police call box has taken up residence in my skull. She's very insistent. Hence this speculative post-13th Doctor's death TARDIS-centric fic was born.

It was curious the way this wanted to be written - if you ignore little bits here and there, it almost sounds like Rose more than the TARDIS. I might expand on this a little, if the mood and inspiration strikes me in the future.

Reviews aren't necessary. I just needed this out of my brain, if that makes ANY sense.


	2. Dive

**_Amarantos_**

_By TwinEnigma_

_

* * *

_

II: _Dive_

The tear is small, deceptively benign.

She knows better and skirts it cautiously, her senses on high alert. She's scouted many of these in days long past and times still to come and she knows they can be unpredictable. She's not as young as she once was and, without her Doctor, she will be unable to recover if something goes wrong.

She circles the tear slowly now.

It's so small, just a sliver in time and space. It hardly looks like it could destroy universes.

Looks can be so misleading.

Once upon a time, her Doctor would be guiding her close enough that he could repair it. Once upon a time, he burnt out a sun to widen that gap just a hair's breadth. Once upon a time, those tears nearly consumed the universe and reality as the stars burned out, one after another.

And now she stands on the precipice, ready to dive into the breach.

It's a dangerous thing she's about to do. She was past her prime when her Doctor stole her heart and she's never been quite the same since the Time War, no matter how much that sweet, beloved man had tried to help her. There's a very, very good chance she's leaping to her death.

Her Doctor is not here to stop her.

She pours as much as she can into her shields and plunges in, focusing on that one, long-forgotten path.

In her memories, her Doctor calls out _Geronimo_ like a benediction.

_Allons-y_, she thinks.


	3. Bleed Out

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_Warnings:_ Mention of suicidal ideation.

* * *

_III: Bleed Out_

She emerges from the tear, battered and utterly exhausted. Her form shudders, wracked with pain from the jarring injuries sustained during her journey, and she can feel the sparks from the shorted panels in her control room. A status check confirms her fears: she lives, but her navigation and communication systems have been shorted out completely and her power is dangerously low. Several other critical systems are near failure and many of her internal supports are mangled beyond repair. Her sensors are about the only thing still functional.

She is adrift and alone, save for the steadily dimming pulse of the vortex in her heart, and she is dying.

It doesn't matter much anyway, she thinks tiredly. She knew this was a one way trip when she started. Last time, it'd killed her and, though she'd hoped to see her Doctor one last time before it did, it looks like her plans have failed. She's alive, crippled and dying, but still terribly aware and that means she's missed her mark completely.

She thinks it's almost funny in a horrible way that she can't even kill herself properly.

She retreats inward, shutting down and diverting power from as many rooms and subsystems as she can to lessen the pain. Behind her, the tear widens, spilling just enough energy to keep the vortex pulsing. It's not a good sign, but she has no power to fix it and her Doctor is...

He'd be so mad with her, if he were here.

She curls in on her own consciousness to wait for the end, and in the distance, she thinks she senses a ghost of her own kind. Fitting for the last of her kind, she supposes. Perhaps she'll see him, too.

She is so old and so tired.

She sleeps.


	4. Surprise

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_

* * *

_

_IV: Surprise  
_

She is surprised when she slowly wakes up. She certainly hadn't expected to ever again.

"Ah, there we go," a voice says from within her control room. It's male, young, and _impossible._

She wills her sensors to life, fixing on the intruder in fear, anger and desperate hope.

It's not her Doctor.

It's a young human male, hardly out of adolescence, and he's brushing off his hands as he observes the rather hodge-podge device he's linked into her power assembly. She can feel it drawing in power from outside, changing it, and spinning it back into her – a universal energy transformer.

Impossible, she thinks.

"Now, let's see if she'll boot," the stranger says, approaching her console. He pulls on a set of glasses, gently brushes soot off her monitor, and watches the monitor flicker to life.

She watches him in wary wonder, quickly running a basic check of her systems. There's more damage than she had realized and, with horror, she realizes she can't run away or protect herself, much less talk to the intruder. Her translation and navigation circuits are fried, the telepathic emitters are little better, over half her stabilizers and shields are shot and the only reason her engine is charging at all is because of the energy transformer that strange intruder has grafted into her power assembly. Frankly, she's surprised her outer plasmic shell is as intact as it is.

"What on earth?" he murmurs, narrowing his eyes at the screen.

Without her translation circuits, she knows he can only see Gallifreyan on the monitor, the tongue she was first programmed in and a language utterly incomprehensible to the humans of earth.

"Translation circuits must be damaged," he concludes, much to her surprise.

She watches as he steps back and moves around the central console towards the panel where the circuits were, as if he knew exactly where to find them. He can't know, he shouldn't know, there's just no way... it's impossible, she knows that. Only her Doctor would know and this... this _stranger_ wasn't him!

He kneels next to the correct panel, rummaging through one of his pockets, and then the familiar sound of a sonic screwdriver starts up.

She reels in shock and denial.

Who is this man?

* * *

**AN**: It's weird how much this wants written. I am bizarrely motivated.


	5. First Step

**_Amarantos_**

_By TwinEnigma_

_

* * *

_

_V: First Step_

"My name's Jimmy," he says. "What's yours?"

She does not understand, but is also mildly annoyed by his failure to answer her question. He unnerves her with how much he is not her Doctor and how much he seems to know about her workings.

"Well, you have got a name, haven't you?" he asks, looking at the monitor which now serves as her only means of speaking.

She does not answer, leaving her original query starkly present.

"Silent treatment, eh?" He raises an eyebrow and sighs, kneeling down to pull out another circuit board – this one is melted and he mumbles about its state in surprise. He then loudly adds, "I don't blame you. I wouldn't trust me either."

She scoffs and decides to change tactics. When her telepathic circuits are restored, then she'll get her answers. For now, she's got other questions for the strange human fellow.

He looks up at the screen and pushes up his glasses as he reads her question. "Oh, well, that's easy!"

His voice lifts lightly and, for a very painful moment, he reminds her of her Doctor, in a form long gone.

"We found you by a dimensional tear," he says brightly, running his sonic screwdriver over another circuit board. "Me and Noble, I mean. She's brilliant, just brilliant. Wait until I get your telepathic field up again! I promise you'll love her."

He pauses, muttering to himself about checking for spares, and then pipes up again, "Sorry, I tend to babble. Real lonely, space. Just me and Noble a lot of the time, so we were both pretty excited when we realized you still had a bit of life in you. We patched the tear, towed you to the nearest M-class and, well, here we are!"

She aches with the familiarity. It makes her want to trust him and she knows she shouldn't. She can't. He's human and not her Doctor, no matter how much he reminds her of that long-ago him. A part of her wishes he'd shut up and stop sounding like her Doctor because of what it makes her feel. She's always been such a sentimental fool and if he continues, she'll start to warm to him when she should be properly wary of his intentions. Instead, she focuses on what she's learned, mulling over his words, and then displays a new question.

"Oh, yeah, sorry about that," he says, ducking under her console. "Noble's like you. Says you're one of her kind. She's _really_ excited to meet you."

Another TARDIS? Surely, he's mistaken. She is the very last, one of the things she shared with her Doctor. All the others were destroyed in the Time War. She would know if there was another.

But, then again, she is not in very good shape and it certainly would explain how he seems to know exactly where things are.

"Oi! What is this doing here?"

He crawls out, holding up what looks like a mutilated automotive carburetor that he's disengaged from her console. Frowning, he takes a closer look at her console, noting the bicycle pump and haphazard way things were cobbled together. "These aren't the right parts at all – it's like you're held together with staples and string."

She suddenly hates the way he's looking at her. He has no right to judge her or her Doctor's repairs, the stupid little ape. Her Doctor had done his best, his absolute best, and she is forever grateful.

"These repairs... Whoever your pilot was, he had to be a real wizard. He must have loved you a lot," he says, running his hand over her console in solemn reverence. "I'm sorry. I couldn't find him. I'm so sorry."

She does not know how to respond. There wasn't anything for him to find. Her Doctor was dead long before she started her journey.

He turns away, looking at the carburetor in his hand before setting it down, and reaches down to pick up one of the fried circuit boards.

Hesitantly, she displays a new message.

He chances a look at the monitor and nods slowly. "What was his name?"

She responds and is amused when he blurts out, "Oi! That's a profession, not a name!"

She can't remember how long it's been since she heard human lips say that. She's surprised at how much she's missed it.

He smiles, his hand lingering on the frame of the monitor. "I'll be back. Gotta get some spare parts from Noble. We'll get you flying in no time at all, you'll see."

She wishes him luck – after all, it's not like there's any way to find parts for her anymore. She still doesn't quite believe him about this so-called TARDIS of his.

"You're really lucky, you know," he calls over his shoulder as he walks to the doors.

He is wrong, she thinks: she's the unluckiest old girl ever.

* * *

**AN**: A little bit longer than the last. You have no idea how tempting it is to leave TARDIS's POV and give another glimpse from someone else's eyes. I'll bet you've all already figured it out.


	6. Noble

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_

* * *

VI: Noble  
_

"Good as new," Jimmy says, patting her console gently as he leans in to look at the monitor. His other hand tugs absently at his ear as he considers and happily adds, "Mind, there's still a lot to do yet, but at least you've got your intuition and telepathic circuits back now."

She flashes a simple message of thanks across the monitor as she examines the circuits herself. She wants to do a diagnostic before she brings them online. To her amazement, they are exactly what he claimed them to be - organic bio-circuits of coral, shiny and new, not a hint of wear and tear anywhere, and a perfect fit.

Only a fellow TARDIS Type 40 could have grown these and she is both elated and horrified at the implications.

On one hand, this Noble he spoke of could be a surviving model, long lost and raised by humans. That fact is horrifying enough on its own, since human hands were never meant to hold onto the technology of her kind. On the other hand, she could have gone drastically off course in her journey through the tear and landed herself in the Time War. What a tragedy that would be! And, she muses acidly, perhaps a most fitting end for the chariot of the Oncoming Storm.

There is only one way to find out.

She hesitates, frightened, and her attention wanders to the human.

Jimmy hums an old Earth song as he goes back to work on her. He's been dragging in new parts all day, tweaking and repairing things here and there with the sonic screwdriver. He flutters about from thing to thing, always moving, and, for one blessed, painful moment, he is the spitting image of her Doctor.

She wishes she could be back in those glorious days with her Doctor, back before the War, before the sound of drums, the ache of loss after loss and the consuming madness that nearly stole him.

Suddenly furious with herself, she breaks off, refocusing on her newly replaced circuits. She brings them online slowly per protocol, burying the bulk of her knowledge behind telepathic firewalls.

Immediately, she senses _her._

Another Type 40, no less than two yards away from her doors, and she just is sitting there, casual as can be.

_"Oi, you, what's your name then?"_ the other Type 40 asks, her telepathic broadcast in clear English. _"I'm Noble."_

She is startled by the forwardness of the other and immediately transmits her Gallifreyan call-sign codes in response, as per her basic protocols.

_"Your name, stupid,"_ the other, Noble, demands huffily, instead of transmitting the requisite response codes. _"You do have one, dontcha?"_

She bristles in alarm at the too-human words and immediately raises her external firewalls, retreating to the confines of her internal domain.

"Aw, Noble, you silly moo, you've spooked her," Jimmy pipes up, his fingers pressed against a silver band on his wrist. He raises them, going back to what he was working on. "Don't mind Noble. She's a bit..."

She reaches out for his mind as he searches for the word and is surprised when she bounces off his curiously strong mental shields.

"That's rude," he admonishes her. "I'd have let you in for a bit if you'd asked nicely."

She sulks a little, now thoroughly rattled. No human she's ever encountered needed mental shields like that.

"Anyway, you shouldn't mind Noble," Jimmy says, glancing at the monitor. "It's all hot air - she's just a bit jealous of the attention I'm giving you. She'll settle down when she realizes you're not out to steal me from her."

She practically recoils. She's got no interest in a human who reminds her too much of better times, no matter how much of a sentimental old fool she is. The ache she gets when he does something that's so like her Doctor is far too deep and fresh for her to bear. It doesn't help that sometimes she can practically see the Doctor in him, like an echo across time and space.

"Besides," Jimmy says, "You're still mourning your pilot, right? There's never going to be another for you, is there?"

She agrees sadly – there will never be another Doctor. She's failed to reach him and now she is just going to have to deal with the fallout.

Jimmy connects the cables and the replacement view screen flickers to life. He stares at it a moment and then admits, "Noble mourns her past pilots, too. She doesn't say it, but I can feel it."

For a moment she pities the other TARDIS, Noble. She doesn't think she could handle losing one pilot only to have them replaced by another and another, time and again.

"I miss them too," he says, screwing the screen's exterior housing panel back in place. "We were family. Not much of one, mind, but enough. It's just us two now."

She understands, empathy flooding her internal telepathic field. His heart rate fluctuates a little and she knows he felt that, even with his shields in place.

"Me and Noble, we go back a long time," he adds. Jimmy is moving again, back to the pile of parts he'd hauled in, and rummages through them. "She's been in my family for generations. That silly old moo just won't have anyone else."

Her intuition circuits twitch. She feels like she's missed something vitally important.

Jimmy clears his throat, looking at her monitor with watery eyes, and lets down his mental shields a little bit. "Your pilot, this Doctor fellow... Why don't you tell me about him?"

She tells him.

* * *

**AN:** I am utterly transparent. Really, I am. Utterly and completely. Also, Noble is amazing. I almost want to switch POV just to have a scene with her.


	7. Beg To Differ

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_

* * *

_

_VII: Beg To Differ  
_

It's surprising how easily the stories pour out of her once she's started. She can't help herself. She's been alone ever since her Doctor's death and he'd stopped taking on companions long before that. This is the first time in ages she's been able to talk to someone and it's liberating, like a weight has been lifted from her.

She talks as Jimmy continues his repairs, telling him about the kind, grandfatherly healer that was her Doctor and how he loved and cherished his family and friends. She tells him about the dedicated Doctor who was the champion of those who could not protect themselves, who solved crimes and riddles and saved the day. She tells him about her Doctor, the kindred spirit that always stood by her side.

Jimmy doesn't need to know about the other sides of her Doctor. There is no need for him to know of the lonely old man who had lost his family and people to war and his friends to the inevitable progression of time, or of the man who had nearly lost his mind in his grief and the memories of past failures. He doesn't need to know about the Doctor's painful, agonizing last regenerations and the terrible circumstances under which they occurred, or about the soldier who was given a horrifying choice.

She wants him to know the hero she adores, not the tortured survivor she mourns.

She dives into tales of her more memorable journeys, projecting images and her impressions of foreign worlds. She's been so many places and times that she can hardly remember them all, but she tries.

It's when she's telling Jimmy about the time she was blown off the Titanic and her Doctor saved London that it happens.

Jimmy frowns, confusion lacing his thoughts. "That's not how it happened."

She stops, her intuition circuits twitching, and then assures him that she is correct. Her memories are not affected by the damage she sustained.

"No, Torchwood stopped it," he says, matter-of-factly.

_"Impossible,"_ she says. Her memories are not wrong. She knows what happened – well, mostly, but that's not the point, because she was definitely there. She had a front row seat! She shows him this memory, including the telemetry and timestamps, even as her intuition circuits hum with an inkling of suspicion.

"Now that is _weird_," Jimmy says, putting on his glasses, and presses his fingers to the silver band on his wrist. "Noble, please transmit records for the London Titanic Incident."

The other TARDIS hums, a sulking and sleepy grumble, and something on the silver band clicks. Tiny silver ball bearings rise from it, spinning into a circle before the human.

She watches in curiosity as blue light shoots from the little bearings, forming a holographic image of news broadcasts and newspaper headlines. Classified documents follow shortly thereafter, all bearing Torchwood marks.

"I'm missing something," Jimmy murmurs, running a hand through his hair as he skims them. His hand stops, tugging absently on his ear, and she feels his surface thoughts racing and colliding in a dizzying fashion, much like her Doctor's had once upon a time. "Think, think..."

She ignores him, focusing on the holograph. It's not technology she is familiar with and the documents look rather authentic. She turns her attention to the newspapers and broadcasts, one of which mentions a drink company being bought out. There has to be a clue, she thinks.

"The transformer!" Jimmy shouts, suddenly, eyes wild and face alight with realization. "Of course!"

In that moment, he resembles her Doctor so thoroughly that she feels like he's _back._

"We found you by a dimensional tear," he explains, practically bouncing as he presses his fingers on the silver band and reaches out for Noble with his mind. Immediately, the images in the holograph change to a view of space and a rather unflattering view of one rather beat up looking blue police call box in front of a rather ominous tear in space.

She decides it's a very weird thing to see an image of herself when she was more or less dying.

"At the time, we assumed you and your pilot were trying to fix it and something went wrong," Jimmy continues excitedly, her Doctor peering out of every word and gesture, and she thinks this is so much more than mere resemblance. "But you weren't, were you? No, _you_ came _through_ the tear, which is why your engines were draining instead of charging! I just assumed it was damage, but it's not! You're from another universe!"

He pauses and draws in a breath through his teeth. "Oh, that's brilliant."

She is silent, her thoughts drifting as she considers this and the steady humming of her intuition circuits. Without her navigation circuits, she's unable to check but she's got a feeling.

A mad hope rises in her heart.

"What were you and your pilot doing in there?" Jimmy asks, giving her a curious and gentle mental nudge. "You both could have been killed."

She sends him an affectionate nudge, ignoring the question, and asks if he lives near a rift.

"Course I do," he says. "Noble's flown out of Cardiff for centuries. Why?"

She hums happily.

It turns out she might not have missed her mark after all.

* * *

**AN:** Utterly transparent, me.


	8. Waiting Game

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_

* * *

_

VIII: Waiting Game

_"Tell me about yourself,"_ she says. _"I'm curious."_

"I'm not all that exciting," Jimmy answers, examining her supports. "How are you feeling, anyway?"

_"Much better,"_ she says, happily. Outside her firewalls, she hears Noble humming an old Earth song and it's terribly hard to resist humming along with the other TARDIS.

She feels great. The new circuits are working wonderfully and her console is in better shape than ever. Her supports, which she'd assumed had been damaged beyond repair, are nearly restored after an injection of bio-organic plasmic regeneration solution unique to this universe and a good solid night's rest.

"The plasmic regenerator's brilliant, isn't it?" he says, smiling, and she agrees – it makes her feel a thousand years younger.

Jimmy and Noble have done so much for her, more than an old girl like herself was worth. It almost makes her feel bad about what she's planning.

Almost, she thinks.

She's come too far to give up now.

"So what do you want to know about me?" Jimmy asks, moving on to her console.

She struggles to hide her excitement as he starts to take off the panel that leads to her navigation circuits and asks how he became a pilot.

"I'm time sensitive," he responds, slipping on his glasses. "Well, a lot a folks are nowadays, but pilots like me? We got it bad. We can feel it all moving about up there. Pulse of the universe, they call it, or something. It's not a pulse, not really – more like a wobbly flux of time stuff and it's really hard to describe what it's like. I mean, well, it's there, right? And we got a sense for it. Kinda like telepathy or something, but not. Runs in my family, at any rate, so I signed up for the training and Noble was waiting for me when I finished."

She thinks it's somehow ironic that it's the humans her Doctor's proud race once looked down on that are now carrying a ghost of a talent that once belonged to them. _"There are more pilots?"_ she then asks, curiously.

"Oh yes!" Jimmy says proudly and, again, her heart wrenches with the similarity to her Doctor.

As soon as he's repaired those circuits, she will be free to act, she thinks. _"What do you do?"_

"Nothing as glamorous or exciting as your stories," he replies absently and murmurs about calibrations and potential differences between parallel universes. "We mostly just fix tears and look out for anomalies in time. It's dangerous work. Sometimes..."

He pauses, shaking his head sadly, and finishes, "Sometimes, we don't make it."

She isn't sure how to respond to that. She is no stranger to loss, but she's carried that burden alone for so long and she wants to avoid telling him that she understands. It'd lead to questions she doesn't want to answer.

_"That stupid spaceman,"_ Noble groused, brushing against her telepathic firewalls. _"Probably gone and started brooding by now. I can feel it."_

She regards the other TARDIS warily. Noble is strange, too human and ultimately unsettling in her brash attitude. And yet, Noble is one of her kind. She's not talked to another of her kind in so long and she longs for the contact, even if she is off-put by the other TARDIS.

_"Why do you speak like that?"_ she asks.

_"Cause I do,"_ Noble answers, as if it's the most patently obvious thing in the universe and she thinks, perhaps, she's heard that same tone of voice somewhere before, a long, long time ago.

_"We're all different,"_ Noble adds. _"Isn't it like that where you're from?"_

She reels for a moment, unable to fully believe the words and the sense of joy and sorrow they bring to her. _"No, it's not."_

The silence that follows is deafening.

She feels both Noble and Jimmy, but they've drifted back behind the walls of their own minds and suddenly she feels very alone. She's a stranger in their world, a relic of a universe that she no longer wants to be in.

"I'm sorry," Jimmy says suddenly, his mind brushing against her telepathic field apologetically. "I didn't mean to drift off like that. Bad memories, right?"

She hums soothingly, sending him a feeling of understanding. She and her Doctor both had their fair share of bad memories.

"Had this friend, see – Sam, that was his name, Sam Tyler," Jimmy explains, pausing to curse under his breath as one of the wires burnt his fingertips. "His TARDIS was called Lucy – said it was lucky or something... Always seemed more Stoker than lucky to me, though. Poor old Lucy, coulda used more luck, I imagine. And poor Sam... He was always doing stupid things, letting himself get really tangled up in her telepathic field 'til you couldn't tell one from the other, and taking stupid risks. Anyway, they went out to patch a rift, much like the one where we found you, but something went wrong, really wrong."

He pauses again, connecting the new circuit boards, and continues, "Lucy held herself together long enough to transmat him home before she broke up, but Sam was so tangled up with her field that losing her destroyed his mind. Poor bloke doesn't even know who he is half the time."

She thinks that such a thing would have never happened on Gallifrey. No Time Lord was ever so foolish as to merge themselves with their TARDIS so fully. And yet, she and her Doctor had been so close. She believes she should have died with him and she thinks that she understands what that boy must have felt when his TARDIS died, leaving him behind.

Love and loss makes minds mad.

The last connector snaps in place and Jimmy ducks out from under her console. "That should do it. Probably have to update your charts, though. Some things might be different in this universe," he says, gently resting his hand on the console. "We don't want you falling into whatever got poor old Lucy."

She agrees and starts to bring her navigation circuits online for preliminary diagnostics, excitement slowly building in her heart.

"I'll be back," Jimmy says, as he stuffs his sonic screwdriver in his pocket, and heads for the door. "Just going to have Noble make a copy of her charts for you."

The diagnostics pop up all green and she immediately brings the navigation system online, getting her first look at where she is.

Jimmy opens the door and steps out, closing it behind him.

She waits until he is about a yard away to lock the door, ignoring his telepathic shout as he realizes what just happened. Her engines roar to life and, with a joyous cry, she dives into the past, the light of a key long thought lost as her guide.

_I am coming, Doctor,_ she thinks.

* * *

AN: Jimmy babbles a lot and you're getting more infodump than you probably care about. Terribly sorry. Still utterly transparent.


	9. Missed You

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_

* * *

_

_IX: Missed You  
_

She appears on a street corner in London, giddy with delight. She can feel her missing key nearby, moving in her direction at a painfully slow, definitely pedestrian pace. She can't wait, she just can't, because it's been so long, too long, since she's seen her Doctor and she doesn't care.

And then she feels _her._

Noble is sitting in the parking space directly in front of her, the chameleon circuit displaying a red sports car with dark, tinted windows. Jimmy gets out, radiating deceptive calm as he touches his sonic screwdriver to the meter, and she can easily see the legacy of the Oncoming Storm in every cell of his being.

_"Go back to where you belong,"_ she tells him. _"This is none of your business."_

Jimmy pulls a key on a chain out from under the collar of his shirt and over his head as he approaches. He sweeps aside the standard lock and inserts it, turning it, and she is horrified to realize it's a master key, the only key she can't lock out.

He enters, silent as he approaches her console.

_"Please leave, this doesn't concern you,"_ she says. She's waited too long and come too far.

"You _absolute_ idiot!" he shouts, hands balled into fists at his sides. "Do you have any idea what you could have done?"

She regards him in shock, before it melts into more of an astonished annoyance. She's been to the ends of the universe and back more times than she can count and this human, who's little more than a speck of dust in the grand scheme of things, has the gall to think he can lecture her? The absurdity of the situation is astounding.

"This isn't some game," Jimmy continues, fury distorting his features. "We have rules for a reason! This is _my _world's history you're screwing with! If someone found you, the damage could be..."

She tunes him out, turning her attention back to the key. It is closer now, across the street, and she can _feel_ him. Delight bubbles through every part of her and she quickly extends her telepathic field to try and get his attention. _"Look over here, look at me,"_ she pleads in her heart.

A flicker of fond affection and wistfulness tickles the edge of her telepathic field, moving closer, but still on the other side of the street. A second connection follows, weaker, more human and familiar somehow, but long forgotten.

_"Look, Rose! A police call box. Brings back some fond memories, doesn't it?"_

Rose, she remembers that name, remembers a wish cast into her heart and a bad wolf. Rose, yes, she remembers now. It's been so long.

_"Yeah. I don't remember one on this street though."_ The second connection pauses, suspicion and worry lacing it. _"You don't suppose..."_

_"No, no. He wouldn't risk it."_ Anxiety twirls through her Doctor, a fleeting twirling of threads and possibilities popping up.

_"Well, we could always take a peek."_ This time, mischief and something positively human curls up from the weaker connection.

_"Rose Tyler! That's naughty."_

"You're not even listening to me!" Jimmy shouts, throwing up his arms in frustration. He runs a hand through his hair, tugging at his ear, and then turns around, walking back to her doors. Pausing, he looks back at her console and, biting back his anger, says, "I'm going to get some coffee. You stay right here. Don't _move._ Noble's got an eye on you."

He disappears out the doors and she can immediately feel the playful connections at the edge of her field turn into full-on surprise.

_"Is that really you, old girl?"_ the faint mental voice asks.

She responds in a burst of joyous yes's. She can't remember a time she's been so happy to see him and he's already hurrying across the street with the girl, cars bleating out protests as they make their way across.

They are almost to the doors when Jimmy reappears, practically sliding in front of them as he blocks the doors with his body. "You can't go in there."

There is a moment of stillness and overwhelming shock from her Doctor and his companion as they get a good look at him.

"Why not?" her Doctor asks, suddenly all mischief and smiles. "It's just a police box, right?"

"It doesn't work. It's broken," Jimmy says quickly.

"Then surely a peek wouldn't hurt," Rose says, trying to worm around him.

Jimmy brushes her away even as the Doctor tries to get around him from the other side. "Clear off! This doesn't belong to you. It's private property!"

She has come too far and is too close for that stupid human to interfere now, no matter how much he means well. Frustrated, she snaps open her doors, causing him to stumble and fall inside.

"A bit bigger on the inside, yeah?" Rose quips, giggling.

Her Doctor doesn't hesitate, stepping over Jimmy easily and practically skipping to the console with Rose on his heels.

Jimmy rolls, shifting onto his feet and hastens to follow. "Don't touch that, you don't know what you're doing!"

But her Doctor isn't listening, his mind touching hers in delighted awe as his fingers dance over the controls. "You've been repairing her! How did you deal with the energy loss – Oh! A transformer! You installed a transformer! That's brilliant! Why didn't I think of that?"

She sends him soothing assurances that she's all right and she knows he's always done his best, always.

"You can't be in here!" Jimmy shouts, clearly frustrated and confused. "You have to leave."

"Where's the Doctor?" Rose asks, glaring at him, and slowly, her Doctor turns as well, regarding the man seriously.

She tells her Doctor the truth and his face falls. She can feel his sadness, the loneliness building in his single heart at the revelation that he is now the last legacy of the Time Lords, and she whispers comforts, because she's here now with him and Rose forever.

"The Doctor? Wait... You know her pilot?" Jimmy asks, confused. "But... she's not... Who are you?"

"Oh, me? I'm the Doctor," her Doctor says. "Well, one of them. Long story, very fascinating. Now, a better question is who are _you_ and how is it that you know so much about repairing the TARDIS?"

Jimmy's face shifts to a blank, guarded expression, his mental shields immediately flaring to life as he raises his hands and begins to back up. "I'm no one important."

_"Jimmy means well,"_ she tells her Doctor, apologetically. _"He saved me."_

"Now, see, that's not exactly true," her Doctor counters. "You can't just walk into a hardware store and pick up bio-organic coral circuits. They have to be grown from the same type of ship. And this old girl is the last of her kind, so it's rather odd that you'd have the parts _and_ know exactly how to fix her. So, _who are you_?"

Rose's hand twitches towards her jacket.

"Noble!" Jimmy shouts, his fingers slapping against the silver band on his wrist, and then he disappears in the brilliant blue of a transmat.

"Where'd he go?" Rose asks.

_"Back to his TARDIS, Noble,"_ she tells her Doctor, even as his fingers dance over her controls in an attempt to track him.

"What?" he goggles, staring at her console in shock. "What?"

Obligingly, she flips on the view screen, showing the red sports car as it begins to disappear.

Rose makes a noise of surprise and asks, "Is that another TARDIS?"

"Oh, that's clever," he says, watching it. "We walked right by her and didn't feel a thing."

_"Even put her on the meter,"_ she agrees, more than a little amused. _"Want to follow him?"_

Her Doctor's expression is one of absolute childish glee. "Oh yes!"

The engine roars to life and Rose hangs on to her Doctor for dear life, laughing joyously as they tumble back into the seats together.

She isn't the only one who's missed this.

* * *

**AN:** Yes, yes. Jimmy did park a TARDIS on a meter. Can we get back to Shakespeare now, Miss Cooper?

I probably borked the characterization. Probably. On the other hand, they're probably used to identical-appearing people by now.

I do have a slight tentative sequel planned for when I finish this one.


	10. Same Difference

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_

* * *

_

_X: Same Difference  
_

She hums in joy as she follows Noble's trail, a phoenix taken flight, and yet it's not long before she realizes it's not the same. She's horrified to realize that's she's forgotten so much of her Doctor and his companions in the long, long years since these two departed and her Doctor's death. Rose is little more than a mote of memory, an impression of a girl she clearly is no longer, and she realizes sadly that this Doctor does not have the burden of the added losses and horrors his later incarnations endured on his shoulders. He is her Doctor, but he is different.

It's a sobering thought.

She sighs, her joy dwindling to melancholy. She'd known this was a possibility when she'd leaped into the tear, hadn't she?

No, not really, she supposes. She hadn't intended to survive the journey in the first place, at least not more than the moment it'd have taken to see him again, and, thus, she had failed to consider the possibility of both her success and survival. She'd just wanted to see his face again, no matter what the cost.

It figures. This is the first time she's been able to grant her own wish and it's exactly what she wanted and everything she hadn't given a thought to. Goodness, wishes can be a complicated business.

She shivers off the melancholy, replacing it with resolve. She's got one last shot, one last grand adventure with her Doctor, and that's one more than she could have hoped for. She's not going to waste it.

She turns her attention inward, to her Doctor, and gives him an affectionate mental caress.

"How did she get here, Doctor?" Rose asks, running her hand along the console. Her mind flickers with a mix of things, confusion and worry and an old ache that has not quite healed. "Last time, she died, right?"

"I'm curious myself," her Doctor replies, but his mind says he suspects and his joy at seeing her is mixing with his disappointment at what he supposes she must have done to get here. He's a confounding, dizzying mix of emotions good and bad. He glares at the console and adds, "I think I know _why_, though."

_"I'm sorry,"_ she tells him, even though she's not and he knows it. It's impossible to put one past him. She tries to explain that he shouldn't worry and it comes out a pathetic _"Jimmy fixed it."_

Her Doctor looks up at her, past the time rotor, and sighs heavily, "It's because I'm the only Doctor with a timeline she's able to cross. All the other me's, she can't go back into their pasts. It's too dangerous – well, on her own, anyway. Because I chose to stay with you, I'm out of their timelines. With every step forward I take here, I'm making my own path. She can hone in on that, right, old girl?"

She hums in agreement, typing out a yes on the screen for good measure.

He pauses, his head lowering again. This time, it is with the weight of loneliness and a fathomless sorrow reborn. "And, more than that, I'm the only Doctor left. The other me is gone."

Rose's emotions spike in horror and shock. "No way! That's..."

"Thirteen lives," her Doctor reminds her, sadly smiling. Weary acceptance hangs around his mind like a shroud. "Thirteen lives well-lived. The old girl stayed with him to the very end."

"But," Rose murmurs, her face falling, "He's... He's supposed to be forever."

"I know," he replies, hugging her close with one arm. "I know."

She lets them mourn quietly and continues tracking. She has mourned too long already and, though the ache will never fade from her heart, she doesn't want to linger on it now that she's found her Doctor again. Someday, maybe, her Doctor will ask about the three incarnations that followed him and the events of his death, but she knows it will be a long time in coming. She remembers that this incarnation was fond, too fond, of that form and had resisted parting it in his attachment to that life. She suspects her Doctor will be no different now.

Her Doctor changes, but never that much in the end, not really.

Noble's signature flares to the right and past the next century, slowing perceptibly. She knows immediately that the other TARDIS is getting close to her target destination and is preparing to land, so she taps her Doctor's mind to get his attention and displays the telemetry.

"Looks like we're catching up," he manages, his voice a little rougher, raw with emotion held back. "Honestly, you'd have thought he'd have had her appear as a DeLorean. Much more appropriate for a time-traveler, a DeLorean. Loved that movie – all wrong, of course! You know, it'd have never worked, not with those equations. In fact, the inhabitants of Hemulry Twelve used to use a similar engine system, well, sort of... It had a habit of blowing up spectacularly, but it definitely couldn't travel in time, no!"

Rose resists the urge to giggle, sniffling as she rubs her eyes.

She watches them, amused. Her Doctor always seems to know what to say to clear the air. Oh, she remembers it drove some of his companions mental, but she wouldn't trade it for anything now. She's missed him too much.

"I still can't believe there's another TARDIS out there," Rose says, her mind calming and leaving the raw emotions to be dealt with later.

Her Doctor's face darkens. "There shouldn't be. I sensed none in this universe before."

She presses against his mind, telling him what she'd learned of Noble and the implications, and receives a whirl of confusion and disbelief in turn. _"Understandable,"_ she tells him, because she didn't believe that Noble existed either, not until she talked to the too-human other TARDIS and had undeniable proof smack in front of her sensors. She still isn't able to quite wrap her mind around the idea of others, though, no matter how her intuition circuits hum with possibilities.

"Why do you suppose he looks like you?" Rose asks, thoughtfully, her mind wandering with curiosity.

"Not sure," her Doctor says, but ideas and fears are percolating there in his head in a dizzying rush.

She tells him about Jimmy and Noble's relation to Cardiff just as Rose pipes up with: "You don't suppose it's like that Gwen girl from Torchwood looking like Gwyneth?"

"Spatial genetic multiplicity! Oh, that's brilliant!" he exclaims, something clicking in his head, and she can feel him trying to feel out the threads of possibility and timelines with a strange, fervent reverence. His fingers dance across the console even as his expression turns into something funny with realization. "Suppose we'll have to move to Cardiff, though."

"Cardiff, _why?_" Rose asks, confusion bubbling through her. "You think the Rift has something to do with this?"

"Yep!" her Doctor laughs, smiling knowingly as he adds, "I'll explain later."

Rose says she's not amused as she cuffs him soundly on the arm, but her mind and body speak of clear affection and fond humor. Rose threatens mortgages and white picket fences and her Doctor threatens to steal her away to Barcelona if she thinks of making him clean up his toys.

She watches them and thinks she could grow used to this and their strange comfort with each other, but it's not the time. They're landing and somewhere out there Jimmy and Noble have the answers they want in more detail than mere glimpses of intuition, probability and wriggling timelines.

"Allons-y!" her Doctor says, and she and Rose both echo him happily.

* * *

**AN:** I was tempted to go right to the confrontation, but this is better. There were things I wanted to touch on first, such as the timeline bit and MetaTen.

I assure you, all will be more or less explained.

More or less.

Mostly.

And I promise if I do get around to a sequel, Jimmy and Noble will both get their chance to POV.


	11. Raw Nerve

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_

* * *

_

_XI: Raw Nerve  
_

She touches down on a relatively small landing platform inside a pressurized atmospheric bubble. Nearby, there's a diner, modeled after a mid-20th century American version, right down to the swoop of the neon lights spelling out _Galaxy Grill_ and the tacky curtains. Several spacecraft are parked nearby, all different, but she instantly spots the other TARDIS.

_"Oi! What do you think you're doing, bringing them here, you dumbo!"_ Noble shouts, hot anger rumbling along her telepathic field. There is an undertone of worry, of fear, but it's not focused on her.

She bristles in annoyance, flashing back, _"I'm doing exactly what I was grown for!"_

And it's true, she _is._ She's a slave to her nature as a TARDIS. Traveling through time and space is what her kind has always been meant to do.

At the console, her Doctor tries to open up a channel to Jimmy, and she can feel the other TARDIS looking over the transmission before she pipes up again, _"Are all of us in your universe so dense? Don't you ever stop to think?"_

She refuses to be cowed by her. _"There are __**no**__ others in my universe. I was the last."_

_"No wonder they're all gone if they're as dumb as you. I pity your pilot,"_ Noble tells her acidly and that tears it.

She lashes out psychically at the other TARDIS with a scream of telepathic fury she hadn't been aware she was even capable of. This too-human TARDIS has no right to say such things to her, not when she watched so many of her kind die before they could develop any real sentience and not when her Doctor gave so much of his life to save her, time after time.

Noble's telepathic field rises and snaps against hers like a physical blow.

_"What was that for?"_ she demands of the other TARDIS, still reeling in shock. No TARDIS of Gallifrey would ever consider such an action.

_"You deserved it," _Noble responds, coldly. _"We've got rules, princess. I don't care how old you are, or what you've seen. You're in our universe now and that means you'll have to play by our rules or people will get hurt."_

There's a slip in the other TARDIS's cold fury and she feels it again, that undercurrent of fear and worry for something – no, _someone_ else. _"Like Jimmy?"_ she ventures.

The other TARDIS does not respond, but she feels the channel open and hears her Doctor's sigh of relief as it finally connects.

"You shouldn't be here," Jimmy says as soon as the link opens.

_"You can say that again, Spaceman,"_ Noble grumbles.

"Well, that's not exactly true," her Doctor says, his entire mind brimming with questions and maybes and what-ifs just waiting for confirmation. "See, you and your TARDIS are a bit of an impossibility considering that they were all destroyed in the Time War and there shouldn't be any left anywhere, anywhen, so, in fact, it's _you_ that shouldn't be here."

Jimmy's expression hardens. "I'm afraid you're mistaken, Doctor. Go home, lock up that TARDIS, and stay there, the both of you."

She feels her Doctor's mental flinch at the words and he feeds her assurances that he will do no such thing. His hand wanders to Rose's, their fingers twining, and she can feel him trying to assure her, too, even as he presses on. "No, no, no, why is it so important we go back? There's something about us, isn't there? Or about that TARDIS of yours, right?" the Doctor asks, somewhere between excitement, triumph and glee.

"Never mind that! Just go home!" Jimmy shouts through the monitor.

Rose's mind pricks with a hint of fear and a memory of something that devours reality.

"No," her Doctor says, crossing his arms and giving the other man an impish grin.

Jimmy's expression is less than amused and Noble shares his sentiments, hissing, _"I could hit that stupid Alien Boy!"_

"You need us to go back," her Doctor concludes, "because we're part of a paradox, isn't that right?"

Jimmy's face, pale and serious, says it all. "Go home, now."

So, this is why Noble and Jimmy were angry, she realizes. Their future depends on her Doctor and Rose being where they are supposed to be and she's gone and stupidly allowed them to go after a future they were still making. Noble was right about her – she really is an utter dumbo! She needs to get them back _now_, before things go bad.

The Doctor's mind brushes hers soothingly, telling her not to fret and listen carefully.

She doesn't understand, not at all, and tries to tell him she's sorry for mucking things up, but he's not listening. She pleads with him, insisting she has to take them back. She doesn't want to be the cause of pain or worse to her Doctor! Not after all she's been through to find him again!

Rose's fear is peaking as well – she tugs on her Doctor's arm, mentioning Reapers.

"Listen, Rose," her Doctor says, shushing her. "Do you hear it?"

Rose stills, confusion bubbling through her, and then a reverent, relieved awe seeps through her. "There's nothing. It's quiet."

"Exactly," her Doctor says, looking back at the view screen and straight into Jimmy's startled face. "The Cloister Bell isn't ringing. We're in no danger."

She pauses, surprised, and quickly runs an internal diagnostic on the bell. It's functional.

"Nice bluff, by the way, but I've been doing this too long," her Doctor adds, all mischief and smiles again. "Well, not that long if you're being technical, but really, I have seen it all before, twice – unless you count the time on..."

Rose thumps him on the arm, smiling.

She can hear Noble laughing and watches as Jimmy's expression turns a little more sour, clearly not amused with whatever the other TARDIS has said.

"Anyway, now that we've established we're all not going to suddenly cease to exist, let's get on with it," her Doctor manages, shooting Rose a suitably chastised look. "Who are you? How did you get a TARDIS and what's your connection to us?"

Jimmy just gives him a long, penetrating look, one that she can feel shake her Doctor to the very bones. "You've already figured it out, haven't you? I'm sure she's told you everything I told her."

"What does he mean, Doctor?" Rose asks and, though she is confused, there's the underlying sense that on some level she's guessed.

"You can see it too, can't you?" Jimmy asks suddenly, tapping his head, "All the threads, all of those possible paths leading here... They all lead back to you, Doctor."

"Who are you?" her Doctor asks and the words have so much weight behind them, all hope and fear and infinite loneliness.

Jimmy shrugs, absently running a hand through his hair. "Me? I'm just a kid who's good at opening doors."

"Who are you?" her Doctor demands. _"Who?"_

Jimmy smiles. "Does it really need saying?"

Rose's temper flares hot, the old wound on her heart aching like fire. "Yes! Yes, it does!" the woman shouts. "Say it!"

She can feel her Doctor flinch – the ache is in both of them, an old wound that has never fully healed.

There is a long silence.

"Let's get you back where you belong," Jimmy says, at long, long last. "Then I'll tell you what I can."

* * *

**AN:** Oh Doctor, you and your paradoxes. Still transparent. Lots of hints. I leave so many. Beware of red herrings.

I'm actually winding this down into it's last two chapters. The sequel idea... is a bit more human-centered and has an awful lot of running.


	12. Spoiler

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_

* * *

_

_XII: Spoiler  
_

She follows them back, back to that street corner they'd recently vacated, and there's hardly a second that's passed on the meter. There's a sort of weight to the whole matter, one she's never felt before, and she wonders if she really does want to know the truth that her intuition circuits can only guess at. There is such a thing as knowing too much, as she learned from her Doctor long ago.

Speaking of her Doctor, he is practically bouncing on his feet, his anticipation radiating like a sun and she can't help the amusement which bubbles through her.

"Oi!" he says, looking up at her time rotor. "She's laughing at me!"

Rose smiles, her mind filled with a mix of amusement and deep affection as she says, "Quite right, too."

The knock at her doors silences any response and she feels their moods instantly shift as they turn to look.

"I'm sure you have a lot of questions for me," Jimmy says, lingering by the doors. His mind is walled-off more thoroughly than ever. "You must understand, I can't tell you everything."

"Spoilers," her Doctor agrees, a somber and terrible, aching understanding attached to the word and she remembers another form and a doomed song that once danced within her walls, now nothing more than a fading echo.

Jimmy nods, running a hand through his hair, and awkwardly stands there, half in shadows. "Come with me," he says, "Noble wants to talk to your TARDIS alone."

She hesitates. What could the other have to say to her that was so important?

There is a flash of assurance that races from Jimmy and makes her Doctor's mind spike with a mix a surprise and alarm that she tries to soothe down quickly because she knows Jimmy is no enemy.

"There's a place down the street that's got good chips," Rose says, taking her Doctor's hand in hers and looking at him as she tries to assure him, too.

Her Doctor nods slowly, gently placing his other hand over hers for a moment, and the two walk up the ramp to the doors together, following Jimmy outside and out of her telepathic field.

Noble's telepathic field brushes against hers, a subtle cue that she's ready to talk.

She lets down her firewalls and there they are, just the two of them.

_"I'm sure you've already guessed this,"_ Noble says, at long last, _"that Jimmy is a descendant of theirs."_

She admits that she's suspected it for some time now and she knows that the Doctor suspected it, too. For her, it had been Jimmy's words that really clinched it: that time-sensitivity wasn't unusual in his time and his fellow pilots all possessed a strong form of the ability.

_"The Doctor raised me,"_ Noble says, an ancient fondness echoing in the words, and she reels, shocked by the admission.

_"The stupid Alien Boy grew me in a pie tin in the basement of Torchwood. He was my first pilot. Never got very far, though. Just around the system a bit. I was young and clumsy with untested modifications and he was a bit of a dumbo – always was,"_ Noble tells her. _"I've remained with his family through the centuries, but I've never forgotten him. I never do."_

She is amused, a little bit, because she knows that her Doctor is just impossible to forget. He's simply too much to forget. She wonders if Noble has searched the faces of each of her Doctor's descendants, choosing only those who had an echo of her Doctor in them to be her pilots and finding the others all strangely lacking.

_"The reason I wanted to talk to you,"_ Noble pauses, her feelings inscrutable for a moment, _"What will you do when the Doctor dies?"_

She knows she can survive his death, but it's not really what the other TARDIS is asking. Again, she can feel the weight of forever pressing on her supports, the ancient ache of wounds still unhealed. She has lived too long. This Doctor, her Doctor that's both old and new, will be her last, she knows that.

_"I think I will die when he does,"_ she says, finally. _"I don't think I'd ever be able to do what you do, going from pilot to pilot like that. I couldn't bear it. How do you manage?"_

_"I carry on,"_ Noble says with a weary sort of pride. It shifts subtly into an affectionate mischievous feeling and she adds, _"Someone has to look after them. Whole lot's just magnets for trouble – Jimmy's the worst yet! That dumbo couldn't keep himself out of trouble if he tried!"_

She can't help being amused and suggests that the Rift has not only imparted Jimmy with her Doctor's appearance, but his luck as well.

Noble laughs, telepathic field rippling with clear amusement.

_"Are all of us in this universe like you?"_ she asks.

_"Don't be silly, you big dumbo. We're all different,"_ Noble says and this time there's nothing but fondness in it.

_"Quite right, too,"_ she says, _"The universe couldn't handle more than one of you."_

_"Oi!"_ Noble shouts indignantly, but any further protest dies as she abruptly quiets. _"Spaceman's back, princess. Looks like we're out of time."_

She asks her to look after Jimmy, because if he's really like her Doctor he needs it, and bids the other TARDIS farewell even as her Doctor and Rose return.

"Well, that was awkward," Rose says and her mind is somewhat in shock.

"Oh yes," her Doctor admits emphatically, his hands in his pockets and a nervous sort of reeling edge to his mind. "Not every day you find out you've essentially changed the course of human history _and_ evolution forever."

Rose's mood shifts into mortification. "Can you imagine if this had been two years ago? That would have been the worst way to find out _ever_."

"No, the worst way would have been if your mother was with us," her Doctor says quickly and Rose thumps him on the arm for his trouble, irritated but starting to smile again.

"She's not that bad," Rose says, trying to hide a laugh. "Now, if this had been _six_ years ago, in Norway..."

"Oh, now that would have been a _complete_ disaster," her Doctor manages, aghast. "End of the universe and time itself sort of thing."

She watches them with amusement, just enjoying the casual comfort they share. It's so different from the faint impressions of how they were lingering in her memories, but she has the time now to learn them anew.

A phone rings and her Doctor groans, rummaging around in his pocket and bringing the cell phone to his ear as he starts for the console. "Hi, Donna! The meeting, yes, of course! No, I didn't forget. Set my alarm clock and everything! Well, Rose did, but –"

Rose follows, fond amusement filling her mind completely.

"Well, we were going to be early but something important kind of came up and we had to take care of it," her Doctor says, flicking switches and setting dials one-handed. "No, we haven't been kidnapped again! That was only – okay, yes, so maybe it does happen a lot, but we always get out, don't we? That was _not_ my fault! How was I supposed to know that?"

Her Doctor pauses, indicating that Rose should start flipping certain switches near her, and continues, "Yes, yes, we're on our way. We'll be right there. Where are you? Are you in your office? Great! Stay right there! Don't move!"

He spins a dial, his mind brimming with mischievous glee, and then presses down the button to engage the engines.

She has no idea what he's up to, but she goes with the flow, disappearing from the street corner and reappearing in some nice office a few blocks away in front of a horrified woman.

Her Doctor runs up to the doors, throws them open and leans out, grinning like a madman. "Donna! You'll never believe what happened to us!"

"Oi! You can't park that here, Alien Boy!" the woman shrieks, in an all too familiar voice. "Shift it or I'll park my foot in your skinny arse!"

"No? Not even a little?" he asks, pouting a bit.

She laughs then, delight rippling through her telepathic field. The universe is new, strange and full of coincidence and adventures waiting to happen. She has her new old Doctor and his new old companion and friends to share them with. She and her Doctor are no longer alone. One day, she'll die, but not today.

She still has a _lot_ of running to do.

* * *

**AN:** And I cop out so much in this, ha. So many noodle incidents and missing years and a subtle hint about why the Cloister Bell never went off. If you squint, there's a passive reference to River Song. Also: Pete's World Donna - she's going to be epic, so epic I might just do a one-shot for her. Still got the epilogue to go.

I left off Jimmy, Doctor and Rose's discussion because this is focused more on the TARDIS than them. Suffice to say, it is actually an extremely awkward conversation for all parties.

The original lines following MetaTen's speculation on what would happen if Jimmy had appeared at Bad Wolf Bay was a bit of babble that included numerous references to the Doctor's tendency to self-punish, uncanny ability to get tied/chained up and having previously been more than somewhat attracted to the idea of being tied up, followed by Rose indicating he still is, because it's not Doctor Who until the Doctor is tied up. I cut it for complete silliness. It's implied it's been at least six years since they were left on the beach by the original Tenth - assume issues were had and worked out with a judicious application of soul searching, alien invasions, rage mode, noodle incidents and hilarity ensues.

As to what Pete's World Donna is blaming him for, it's a noodle incident. It involves four things. And a lizard. Sort of. You really don't want to know.


	13. Last Journey

_**Amarantos**_

_By TwinEnigma_

_Warnings: _Character Death

_

* * *

_

_XIII: The Last Journey  
_

She knows the end is coming. She's known for a long time now.

Her Doctor is old now, with steel-grey hair and tired features. He sometimes takes her out on small flights, showing his grandchild how to operate the controls, and she remembers another Doctor, another grandchild in their places, ones now lost to the flow of time, a universe away. He leans heavily on a cane and has switched her theme back to the one of his fifth life – he'd always favored that form over the others, even in his thirteenth.

She hasn't flown to save the day for years – that is young Noble's domain now – but sometimes she dreams of it, of the old days and she thinks she longs for one last shot at saving the world, to go out in a fantastic blaze of glory instead of this damnable slow wasting.

One day, she senses Noble, but it's not the young, clumsy Noble she's known. This is a Noble she hasn't seen in a long, long time.

Her Doctor is dozing when Jimmy appears, lingering in the doorway like a ghost. He has aged a little, now very much the spitting image of her Doctor as he once was, and there is an immeasurable gravity to his presence. For a moment, she thinks perhaps it is _not_ Jimmy at all, but she stops herself, because that is impossible.

Her Doctor wakes, as calm as though he'd known they were coming. "Now there's a face I haven't seen in a long time."

Jimmy enters, quietly sitting down next to her Doctor.

"Come to see me off, have you?" her Doctor asks, truth and teasing in his mind, and she can feel he already knows the answer even if it remains unvoiced. "Just as well. I have something I wanted to ask you."

Jimmy nods.

"Press the button – I've already set the coordinates," her Doctor instructs, wearily leaning forward. "Don't worry, it's safe. I've set it to the zone borders."

She knows where they're going and she whispers her gratitude to the barest reaches of Jimmy's mind, nearly recoiling at the churning sorrow beneath those shields. Again she wonders, but she is old and she sees echoes of the past where there are none sometimes.

"Back in the other universe, before the Time War, there was a planet near here," her Doctor says, ancient and unbearably sad. "The Shining World of the Seven Systems, Gallifrey. It doesn't exist here anymore, if it ever did to begin with."

She remembers it in splashes of color and light and burning death. She and her Doctor are cursed to never forget the beauty and horror of their lost home world. When they die, the memory of it shall slip from the world – as well it should, for all things have their time and Gallifrey's has long since passed.

This is her Doctor's goodbye.

They linger here for a while in quiet, until he's ready to leave.

"You know, you never did tell me your real name," her Doctor says, looking at Jimmy carefully. "Never did understand why you chose it."

"I didn't," Jimmy admits, guiding them back home to earth. "Noble gave it to me. I picked her locks when I was a kid, took her for a joyride. Always was good with opening doors."

She laughs with her Doctor, both remembering another who stole their TARDIS away in the night for a joyride that will only end after over a thousand years.

Her Doctor then gives him a level stare and asks, "Will you indulge a dying old man and tell me?"

Jimmy lets a little sad amusement slip through as they land. "If you tell me yours."

"Ha!" her Doctor scoffs. "It used to be there was only one time, one reason we could say such a thing! But it doesn't matter now, does it? They're all gone, all of them. No one left to care about a little old tradition but me."

His face falls and she can feel his exhaustion and sorrow keenly. "Damn the rules. I think I want at least one person to remember it."

Jimmy nods with a weary acceptance, leans in and whispers the burning, lance-like syllables of his name.

Her Doctor smiles, sadly, "I should have known." He then whispers his own, the terrible secret he has revealed to so very few, and it is the same.

Jimmy leans back, his mind churning behind his mental barriers, and finally asks, "What does it mean?"

She sighs and her Doctor shakes his head as he replies, "Nothing, everything. Funny universe, that."

She can feel her time rotor beginning to slow, the steadily dimming pulse of her Doctor, and Noble's quiet vigilance. It's not long now.

"You know, the Time Lords were cruel. Their power and their inaction was their eternal curse and eventual downfall," her Doctor admits. "The question is what shall you, humanity, become?"

Jimmy is silent a moment, watching as she begins to power down her systems for the last time. At last, he stands, moving towards the door, long coat swirling around him, and looks back. "We go where we're needed. And sometimes we bring revolution, and sometimes we bring peace, but we are _always_ healers."

"That's good, then," her Doctor says, closing his eyes and smiling. "The Universe needs a Doctor."

"The Doctor in the TARDIS, forever," Jimmy says solemnly, a promise.

_"As it should be,"_ she murmurs, drifting off to eternity in time with the fading heartbeat of her Doctor.

* * *

A universe away, a deceptively young-looking man with dark hair and a tweed jacket pauses in his step, paling slightly as one of his hearts skips a beat.

"Doctor, are you alright?" a girl with red, red hair asks him. Her fingertips brush the panels of an antique blue police call box, which is shiny, shiny new.

He blinks, as though woken from a dream, and smiles thinly. "Yes, yes, of course. I'm alright."

Unseen, their observer turns away, radiating sorrow and the echo of losses remembered from the doorway of another blue box. His hand rests on the blue wooden frame of her weathered doors and she feels his eternal sorrow and so much more. Pity for the girl who does not yet realize she has opened Pandora's Box and will never be able to close it again. Empathy for the past version of himself who realizes the only other legacy of his kind is gone and cannot bear to tell the girl that he's not alright, because he's _never_ really alright. Sadness for the impossible legacy, the metacrisis, who has gone on the one adventure he has longed for across the millennia.

She soothes him, her telepathic field wrapping around him like a blanket, and he welcomes it.

When the tears are shed, he stands again and looks up to her time rotor as he wipes his eyes. "What do you say, old girl? Who shall we visit next? How about Sarah Jane? Maybe Martha... Not Jack. Not yet. So many old friends to see – I guess that's what happens when you live thirteen lives, more or less."

This is her Doctor's goodbye and she knows it.

She does not think she will survive him very long.

* * *

**AN:** And I'm done. On to extensive TL;DR notes.

_Why "Amarantos"? _

Means never- fading. Refers to several things: 1, the TARDIS and her strength of will; 2, the legacy of the Doctor (and Gallifreyan race/Time Lords by extension) as represented by Jimmy and Noble, and at a stretch, 3, the paradoxes involved.

_What is Jimmy's real name and why is it the same as the Doctor's?_

Timey Whimey Ball of Wibbly Wobbly Stuff involved. Interpret as you see fit, but works into the sequel, The Other Side. Did I mention that I'm an evil writer? Might have forgot about that.

His whole "opening doors thing" is a reference to his apparent name, Jimmy, from "to jimmy," as in pry open a lock.

_We go where we're needed. And sometimes we bring revolution, and sometimes we bring peace, but we are __always_ healers.

Jimmy states earlier that he and his fellow pilots do just that, with a side order of fixing the potholes of the universe. Unfortunately, being humans, trouble is attracted to them and they end up buried to their elbows in it. You can infer that Jimmy has probably stirred up a revolution somewhere at least once. I'm sure that civilization was going to collapse on its own. Probably.

As to Time Lord business, Jimmy's _not_ one - I'm assuming you need to be Gallifreyan, have looked into the Schism, gone to school for it, and obtained your silly robes and hat in order to qualify. It's insane, I know!

_Why two parts for the end here and why end at 13 chapters?_

Thirteen Doctors and a metacrisis clone.

_Paradoxes involved?_

Several - TARDIS's, Metacrisis Tenth's, Bad Wolf's, etc. You should see me when I try to explain the paradoxes to others. Apparently, it's hilarious.

_Hints for the sequel?  
_

Scattered throughout - happy hunting!

And that's it for this one really, so I'll just quote the Bard:

_And if we shadows have offended, think but this and all is mended,_

_that you have but slumber'd here while these visions did appear._


End file.
